Tag Archives: Netherlands

Street Art Museum Amsterdam

There are a lot of tourists in Amsterdam and it’s hard to feel like you’re not somewhere that thousands of people have been before (or actually are right now, standing in front of you, with their cameraphones at the ready), but we think we managed it at least once. Amsterdam’s Street Art Museum is in the Nieuw West district at almost the westernmost point of Amsterdam’s tram lines, in any case at the very end of line 13. And that’s where we met up with our guide Anna and the Dutch couple who were also on the tour.

This striking mural was the first that we visited – ‘Dimension’ by Btoy

Anna has an interesting biography, she grew up in the Ukraine under the Soviet Union, left at 18 to live in London before moving onto Amsterdam, Brussels and New York before settling again in Amsterdam nine years ago. A few years later she quit corporate life to found a Street Art Museum…

Right across the street from ‘Dimension’ are a couple of familiar faces, Johan Cruyff and Van Gogh, by Uriginal

If you have a read about on the museum website you’ll find something saying ‘No we don’t have a map. We have tours’. We initially thought, OK fair enough, but in the end, stunning as the art on the walls is, it was Anna’s stories that really brought them to life. Talking essentially non-stop for three hours (and just try to get a word in!) she told us what the paintings mean (to her, to the artist, to the community), about the artists themselves and their often atypical lives, and about the difficulty of bringing the works into being.

Not all of the walls are bold and bright, take for example the delicately beautiful ‘Safety’ by Alaniz

The paint was only just dry on ‘Fatherhood’ by Stinkfish as it was completed the day before our tour

The most shocking aspect to me was the funding, the typical amount received per wall seemed to be about €2000, seems reasonable I thought, then Anna told us that the lift rental is €800, the paint cost €600, and the artists’ plane tickets were €400 meaning that there is barely any money left over for the artist, never mind for Anna and her tireless efforts at chasing through the bureaucracy. Oh, and while they’re in Amsterdam, the artist stays in Anna’s spare room!

‘Destiny’ by Skount has a very sad story hidden in its details but you’ll have to join a tour to find out what it is

Having seen Johannes Vermeer’s famous ‘The Milkmaid’ in the Rijksmuseum we loved ‘Glory’ by El Pez and Danny Recall.

Vermeer’s ‘The Milkmaid’ in the Rijksmuseum and the Street Art Museum version showing a cheeky bit of leg and surrounded by colourful parrots!

The timelapse video of the creation of ‘Glory’ is jaw-dropping… (video credit: Anna Stolyarova)
[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=895Kmtkhf9A]

Anna in front of ‘Altruism’ by Spok with ‘Fertility’ by Skount in the background. These pieces will soon be lost as this housing estate is slated for demolition.

Detail of ‘Altruism’ by Spok. His technical skill is really obvious here, this is all done with spraycans, just look at the depth and range of colour that he’s managed to achieve

‘Pain and Relief’ by Bastardilla was the museum’s first work

When a 60 year old professional mural painter approached her to contribute a work to the museum, Anna was keen to see what he would do. This version of a traditional Dutch weather clock took longer to complete than any of the museum’s other walls – notice how meticulously measured all the bricks on the painted telecoms box are!

Note how the two pipes sticking out of the top of the building have been cleverly incorporated into ‘Industrialisation’ by La Ira

Towards the end of the tour was an area with some smaller works, all by different artists and very diverse. I love ‘Let Her Be Free’ with a woman in a headscarf of birds by Iranian duo Icy and Sot, she’s the new lock screen on my iPad (bottom left on the collage below).

The last wall that we visited was ‘Tolerance’ by Alaniz, a nice nod to the multicultural diversity of Nieuw West. Anna sees the community as an essential part of the museum’s work and actively looks to include residents in the process. She explained how before any work begins they go door-to-door to speak to all of the building’s residents and get their approval of the plans, as well as encouraging them to visit during the work and inviting them to a completion party.

‘Tolerance’ by Alaniz

You can book a tour of the Street Art Museum Amsterdam through the website, we highly recommend it.

The Canals and Architecture of Amsterdam

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Often called the Venice of the north, a subtitle claimed by other notable European cities such as St. Petersberg, Bruges, and er, Manchester, Amsterdam is famously known for its canals – it has more than any other city in the world – 60 miles of them in total!

Amsterdam canal, Amsterdam, Netherlands

As I’m sure we’ve written about before, one of the first things we like to do when we arrive in a new place is to wander the streets nearby to get our bearings, scope out the local amenities and to get a feel for the neighbourhood. Even better if there are self-guided walks, which for European cities are easier to find, and we’ve particularly enjoyed Rick Steve’s audio tours.

Amsterdam canal, Amsterdam, Netherlands

We started with his guided walk through the city which includes a nice overview of Dutch history and took us to some of the quieter areas just off the main canals and streets. In our apartment we also found a canals walk in the DK Eyewitness Travel book that starts in the central Dam Square, takes a counterclockwise route through the main circular rings of canals: the Singel, Keizersgracht, Herengracht, Reguliersgracht and ends where Prinsengracht meets the Amstel.

The centre of the city, Dam Square. The white sculpture is the National Monument – dedicated to the memory of the casualties of World War II and subsequent armed conflicts. Thankfully there weren’t any casualties of the armed conflict taking place here on the 4th of April, as it was International Pillow Fight Day!

After a couple of years of bad floods at the start of the 12^th century, the locals built a dam across the Amstel river, and the area became known as “Aemstelredamme” – literally “Dam on the Amstel” – which over time and use was shortened to “Amsterdam”. The Dam Square is the location of this original dam and remains to this day the centre of the city.

DK Eyewitness Travel Guide, Amsterdam, Netherlands

The start of the Canals walk in the DK Eyewitness Travel guide.

Keizersgracht means “emperor’s canal”, the white building in the middle (no. 319) was constructed in 1639 and has a beautifully ornate façade of scrolls, vases and garlands. The building to the left of it is reportedly where Russian Czar Peter the Great stopped on his first trip to Amsterdam and got drunk with friends, while the mayor waited at a civic reception further down the canal!

345a Keizersgracht, Amsterdam, Netherlands

Amsterdam’s tall, narrow houses are part necessity, part practicality and part financial, some of which are really narrow – like 345a Keizersgracht.. it even has two front doors so it’s actually 2 separate apartments!

As the city is built on reclaimed marshland, the topsoil is pretty unstable which limits the weight of the buildings. This means they’re all pretty uniform in height and generally constructed of lighter materials (sandstone and brick) and feature large windows to keep the overall weight down.

Houses were taxed on their width, with canal-facing ones attracting the highest rents. It was said that the richest were those that lived on the inside of the canal bend – they’d pay the highest taxes but have the least amount of living space!

The majority date from the Dutch Golden Age of trading and were built by merchants who also wanted to use some of the space for storage, so the roofline includes a beam and pulley for hoisting goods and furniture. To prevent damaging the expensive façade as they were moved up and down, the buildings also lean into the street.

It was rare to find a house without the pulley and wheel in the roof, and we passed a few houses being renovated that had ropes attached so they’re very much still in use

39 Reguliersgracht, Amsterdam, Netherlands

39 Reguliersgracht looks like it’s preparing to dive head-first into the canal!

No two houses are the same, even neighbouring ones built at the same time differ in features or decoration as the owners sought to display their individuality. We especially liked the different shaped gables, and marvelled that some of the really crooked corner buildings were still standing!

Certain designated wider canals are lined with an equally diverse collection of semi-permanent house boats. Ranging from canal-boats to modified commercial vessels, simple floating boxes to elaborate two-storey houses, they all have addresses and most are hooked up to the city’s water and electricity supplies

Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

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The Rijksmuseum is the Netherlands National Museum devoted to art and history. It reopened in 2013 after a massive, decade long renovation project. The result is an excellent museum, where we happily spent a full day and still didn’t get round everything. Its precursor opened in 1800 in The Hague but that didn’t last long, within ten years it was moved to Amsterdam and in 1885 this custom built Gothic style building was opened in the south of the city.

The Rijksmuseum is housed in this magnificent building

The museum’s centrepiece is ‘The Night Watch’ by Rembrandt. I’d read that it gets very busy around the painting as the day progresses so we headed straight there after the museum opened at 9am. It was definitely the right strategy as we were able to get a good look at the famous picture without the jostling and crowds that we found when we passed back through the gallery a couple of hours later.

The Honour Gallery approaching Rembrandt’s ‘The Night Watch’ was deserted at 9.15am

We’d downloaded the Rijksmuseum’s free multimedia app onto our iPads (it’s identical to the one that you can rent at the museum for €5 so well worth it) and decided to begin by taking the 90 minute tour through the highlights of the 17th century galleries (basically the whole of the 2nd floor). This was the great Dutch Golden Age when the country was one of the world’s trade power houses with plenty of riches to finance high art.

In one of the first of the 17th century galleries is a display case filled with decorated shells including this Nautilus cup whose workmanship is of German origin

During the 17th century it was considered prestigious for groups of civic guards to have a portrait painted. ‘The Night Watch’ is an example of this but my favourite on display here is the ‘Banquet at the Crossbowman’s Guild in Celebration of the Treaty of Münster’ by Bartholomeus van der Helst. The audioguide explained the significance of the painting and also details that we might have missed like the reflections in one captain’s breastplate.

‘Banquet at the Crossbowman’s Guild in Celebration of the Treaty of Münster’ by Bartholomeus van der Helst

Scattered amongst the art are artefacts which tell the history in a more personal way, for example, the cabinet of knitted hats which belonged to Dutch whalers who worked in Spitsbergen during the 1700s and were recovered during archaeological excavations of the graves in 1980 – the case’s sign explains:

The skeletons were still wearing their knitted woollen caps. Each cap was individualized; the men recognised one another only by the pattern of stripes on the caps. The men were bundled up so tightly against the fierce cold that only their eyes were visible.

Woollen caps worn by Dutch whalers in the 1700s

The Rijksmuseum’s library contains around 450,000 volumes and acts as an art history research library. It is open to the public as a reading room and for academic research.

Looking down into the Rijksmuseum’s library

While the Dutch men were off trading and conquering the world their wives were left at home twiddling their thumbs. To counteract the boredom (and get through quite a bit of the gold that was piling up) wealthy Dutch ladies furnished doll’s houses which they would then show off to their friends. We were flabbergasted by the detail that went into these, including commissioning a doll sized porcelain dinner service from China!

One of the magnificent doll’s houses, complete with working sink in the kitchen!

The 17th century was also the start of the Dutch obsession with tulips and cut flowers. These were very expensive and to show them off to their best advantage they were individually placed in the corners of huge flower pyramids.

Flower pyramid in the Delftware gallery

On the third floor is the museum’s small collection devoted to the 20th century. It was much less detailed than the 17th century galleries and heavier on the historical items rather than artworks, for example a Nazi chess set with soldier figures representing the pawns and planes, tanks and rocket launchers for the other pieces, is contrasted with the concentration camp jacket of a Dutch woman who was interred from 1943-45.

Highlights from the 20th century galleries (clockwise from left): Dress by Yves Saint Laurent inspired by the work of Dutch artist Piet Mondrian; the F.K. 23 Bantam was designed by a Dutchman for a British aircraft factory during WWI; ‘The Square Man’ by Karel Appel

By this stage we were ready for a rest and so we retreated to the museum’s beautiful airy cafe for a sandwich and a much needed cup of coffee.

Andrew browsing the tempting sandwich menu in the Rijksmuseum’s cafe

The building itself is nearly as interesting as the exhibits it contains. The cafe, ticket office and shop are situated in a newly built underground area which was a complex engineering project as it is below sea level. Moving between the east and west wings of the museum necessitates passing either through this basement or through the Great Hall on the second floor as the ground floor is bisected by a cycle path. The renovation project team wished to close this off to link the two sides of the museum, but the bicycle mad public vetoed the plans.

The Great Hall on the second floor has been restored to its former glory with wall paintings and stained glass

In the Asian Pavilion we found plenty of familiar looking items from our travels – Indian gods, Japanese inro and netsuke, Buddhist temple guardians and Chinese tomb artefacts.

Asian Pavilion (clockwise from top left): Hindu god Shiva; artefacts from a tomb near Xi’an in China; Japanese inro, a small box which hangs from the kimono sash and is secured above by a netsuke; we liked this modern artwork by Indian artist, Subodh Gupta

'Grandfather Clock' by Maarten Baas This ‘Grandfather Clock’ by Maarten Baas made us smile. Every minute the “man” inside wipes off the minute hand and draws a new one!

Dutch colonial history is represented throughout the museum but on the first floor is a whole room showcasing items from this aspect of the country’s past. I particularly liked the cannon with a dragon’s head and we both recognised the model of Dejima, the small island to which Dutch traders were confined in Nagasaki.

These five Javanese court officials are notable for showing that some Indonesians entered into the service of the colonial government and their clothes are a composite of local batik fabrics and European style items

We spent the last twenty minutes of our visit speeding through the Special Collections section, a group of galleries with everything from model ships to dinner sets to fashion and jewellery.

Beautiful dragonfly comb in the jewellery gallery

Although we spent a full day in the museum we could have stayed for longer. The variety of the exhibits kept us interested and the information about the displays both in the galleries and in the multimedia tour were excellent.

Bicycles in Amsterdam

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One of the first things we noticed when we arrived in Amsterdam was the bicycles. They’re everywhere. It makes sense, Amsterdam (and the Netherlands as a whole) is completely flat so there are no pesky hills to worry about, and as the city’s streets are arranged along canals and were built long before automobiles were invented the bicycle is the fastest way to get around. If everyone drove the place would be completely gridlocked, but in fact there are more bikes than residents.

The pavement along our street is crowded with parked bicycles

Having very young children doesn’t stop Amsterdammers from riding their bikes. These bicycles with boxes at the front are called bakfiets, or cargo bikes.

When the kids are a bit older they can be strapped into a seat at the back of the box.

And older still, you might get a tandem for three!

With so much of its population on two wheels, any available place is used for parking, there’s even a dedicated parking garage with 2500 spaces outside Centraal Station. On Saturday afternoon, Amsterdam’s central Dam Square gets pretty crowded…

Many people customise their bikes, maybe to make them easier to spot in that pile of parked bicycles… Clockwise from top left: this one has a knitted frame cover; hand painted frame and basket; plastic flowers around the handlebars

An eco-conscious local hotel advertises its credentials with a wooden framed bicycle at the front of their building

And if you don’t fancy travelling by road you could always rent a ‘canal bike’ and pedal yourself through Amsterdam’s waterways

Jenever tasting in Amsterdam

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Jenever is the national liquor of The Netherlands and Belgium, and while we’re quite partial to a gin and tonic, we’d never heard of Jenever, which happens to be gin’s ancestor.. time to get acquainted..

The Wynand Fockink distillery is on Pijlsteeg, a narrow backstreet just off the main Dam Square in the centre of Amsterdam

We booked ourselves on a 1 hour tasting session at the Wynand Fockink distillery which was established in 1679, but Jenever is known to be much older. We’re glad we reserved a place by email as there was quite a crowd waiting outside before the start of the weekly tastings.

Jenever tasting, Wynand Fockink, Amsterdam

After a short introduction about the history of the drink, the company, and how it’s made it was time to start tasting!

The alcohol in Jenever comes from fermented sprouting grains, which is then triple-distilled before being flavoured with spices and juniper berries – or ‘jeneverbes’ in Dutch – which is where the name comes from. (In Dutch the ‘J’ is pronounced like a ‘Y’ in English, so now you know how to ask for it!)

Julie and I at the Jenever tasting, Wynand Fockink, Amsterdam

Julie and I sampling the limoncello course.. Mmmm!

Andre our guide went on to explain Wynand Fockink produce essentially 2 types of Jenever and a host of different flavoured liqueurs:

Jonge Jenever – Young Jenever. In this case young refers to the age of the recipe not the ageing of the spirit!
Oude Jenever – Old Jenever. The original (and best!) recipe.
.. and Flavoured Liqueurs – For these the alcohol base is bought in and infused with pretty much any flavour you can imagine!

The tasting started with the Jonge Jenever which we thought akin to vodka. We found it quite harsh but not unpleasant – certainly nicer than drinking neat gin. Next up was the Oude Jenever which we thought had more flavour – the spices and juniper came through more and and it was easier to drink. Both of these are aged in metal drums for about 6 months, but Wynand Fockink’s Superior Jenever is matured for about 3 years in old wooden Jack Daniels barrels and the Tennessee sour-mash easily dominates the subtlety of the spices.

The 3 recently renewed stills of the Wynand Fockink distillery where the alcohol for their triple-distilled Jenever is produced

Andre then started talking about the many flavoured alcohols that the small distillery produces, and offered a taste of one of our favourite liqueurs – limoncello! After two different varieties, he said they have a flavour for every occasion or event in a person’s life, some with cheeky names like “Hansje in de Kelder” which translates as “Hansel in the cellar”, and is a Dutch saying similar to the English “a bun in the oven” – although they no longer recommend it for pregnant ladies!

The final round, Jenever tasting, Wynand Fockink, Amsterdam

We also got to sample a few of the many flavoured spirits or liqueurs they make. Left to right they are: “Half and Half” – a blend of orange liqueur and spice infused liqueur (cloves and cinnamon); “Hansje in de Kelder” – “Hansel in the cellar” which tastes of orange, apricot and lemons; “Volmaakt Geluk” – which means “Perfect Bliss” and tastes of violets and roses; and “Drop” – salted liquorice, our favourite along with their limoncello!

Next was his personal favourite flavour: “Drop” – which is liquorice in Dutch, and one of my favourite flavours too! While I was sipping away he said the sweet, salty taste is great for alleviating sore throats. Of the flavoured ones we tried, this and their limoncello were our favourites.

The back wall is full of giant glass jars where they steep the ingredients for flavoured the liqueurs

In the end we sampled 3 Jenevers and 6 different liqueurs in about an hour. After the tasting session finished they opened up the bar next door to the public, but not until we’d had chance to visit their extensive gift shop and get another round in!

two year trip

Andrew and Julie's Travelling Adventures